Russian noun gender (masculine, feminine, neuter)

Это мой дом. Это моя книга. Это моё окно.This is my house. This is my book. This is my window.

Every Russian noun has a grammatical gender: masculine, feminine or neuter. English nouns have none, so my never changes, but in Russian the words around the noun (my, this, new, the past tense of a verb) take a different form for each gender. The good news is that the ending of the noun in its dictionary form (the nominative singular) usually tells you which gender it is.

Quick shortcut: consonant (or -й) → masculine · -а / -я → feminine · -о / -е → neuter · -ь → learn each word with its gender.

Reading the gender from the ending

For the great majority of common nouns this is all you need. The personal pronouns show it too: a masculine noun is replaced by он, a feminine one by она and a neuter one by оно, even when the thing is "it" in English.

• Где стол? — Он там. (Where is the table? It's over there.)
• Где книга? — Она здесь. (Where is the book? It's here.)
• Где окно? — Оно там. (Where is the window? It's over there.)

A handy test: мой / моя / моё

If you are not sure of a noun's gender, you can try putting мой, моя or моё (my) in front of it. Only one of them sounds right:

The same three-way split appears everywhere in Russian: этот / эта / это (this), новый / новая / новое (new), and the past tense (он читал / она читала / оно читало). The full picture has its own lessons, for example Adjective agreement in the nominative and Past tense: the -л form.

The soft sign -ь: learn it with the word

Nouns that end in a soft sign -ь can be masculine or feminine, and the ending alone doesn't tell you which. They are never neuter.

There are helpful patterns: nouns ending in -тель (учитель, житель) are masculine, and nouns ending in -ость (новость news, радость joy) are feminine. For the rest, it is easiest to learn the word together with мой or моя: мой день, моя ночь.

Exceptions worth knowing

• Masculine nouns that end in -а / -я. A few words for male people look feminine but are masculine, and everything around them is masculine: папа (dad), дедушка (grandfather), дядя (uncle), мужчина (man). So ✅ мой папа, never ❌ моя папа.
• Names and some nouns for people can be either. Short names like Саша or Женя are used for men and women, and a few nouns such as коллега (colleague) are masculine or feminine depending on the real person. The words around them follow the person: мой коллега (a man) and моя коллега (a woman).
• Loanwords that don't change. Words borrowed from other languages that end in a vowel usually stay the same in every case and are mostly neuter when they name things: такси (taxi), метро (metro), кино (cinema), пальто (coat). The famous exception is кофе (coffee), traditionally masculine even though it ends in -е: чёрный кофе, мой кофе. Casual speech sometimes treats it as neuter, but masculine is the standard form.
• A handful of neuter nouns in -мя, such as имя (name) and время (time), look feminine but are neuter: ✅ моё имя.

Common mistakes

• ❌ Это мой книга. → ✅ Это моя книга. (книга ends in -а, so it is feminine)
• ❌ Это мой окно. → ✅ Это моё окно. (окно ends in -о, so it is neuter)
• ❌ Моя папа дома. → ✅ Мой папа дома. (папа is a man, so the words around it are masculine despite the -а)
• ❌ Хорошая день. → ✅ Хороший день. (день is masculine, even though it ends in a soft sign)
• ❌ Хороший ночь. → ✅ Хорошая ночь. (ночь is feminine; the soft sign alone doesn't tell you, so it is learned with the word)
• Guessing the gender from the meaning instead of the form. A стол is not "male" and the word окно is not "neutral": for most nouns, including many nouns for people (личность "personality, individual" is feminine, лицо "person, face" is neuter), the gender is fixed and learned with the word. Only names like Саша and common-gender nouns like коллега take their agreement from the person being talked about.

Quick check

Which form fits?

1. "Это ____ дом." (мой / моя / моё)
2. "Это ____ школа." (мой / моя / моё)
3. "Это ____ море." (мой / моя / моё)
4. "Это ____ дядя." (мой / моя / моё)
5. "Это ____ дверь." (мой / моя / моё)

Key takeaways

• Russian nouns are masculine, feminine or neuter, and the words around them change to match.
• The ending of the nominative singular usually shows the gender: consonant / -й → masculine, -а / -я → feminine, -о / -е → neuter.
• Nouns in -ь can be masculine or feminine (never neuter), so it helps to learn each with its gender; -тель nouns are masculine and -ость nouns are feminine.
• A few nouns for men end in -а / -я (папа, дедушка, дядя) and are masculine; кофе is traditionally masculine.
• Things are replaced by он / она / оно according to their gender, not by "it".